The human state is one of walking on ice. Any distraction in concentration, any slight step to the left or stumble to the right will cause your feet to slip and will cause your entire being to stumble. Your footing is tenuous and it is difficult to keep fully upright. But there are many distractions. The distractions tell you to buy more, fill your lives with more, take pleasure in more, Build yourself up in life by disregarding more. Disregard God’s creation, disregard your neighbor, disregard your own family, simply strive your what you want, the distraction yell out to you. The ice is slippery and you start to waver, you start to fall.
It does not help that God’s fire is close by. For Christ did not come to bring peace to the earth. No, Christ came to bring division and fire. The fire is ablaze and it is making the ice even glossier to the eye, and slippery to the touch. Knobs of ice melt into fine shimmers and foothold disappear into a level glaze. The distractions are too much, you step toward one of them, thinking that it is the way you should go, enticed by what you see and you fall. You fall fast expecting the impact of the ice, but find yourself in the hands of God who now holds you above the fire, the fire that Christ has brought.
The fire burns in a pit and its heat comes up from below. You look into God’s eyes and are unsure of what you see. Do you see peace for your future? Do you see division? The heat from below is hot on your hands. You look close and see that God is trying to decide, about you. You start to plead about your good works. But it is of no use. God’s eyes do not change. Good works do not keep you out of the fire, nor do bad works put you in. All people walk the slippery line, and it is only by God’s good will and through God’s good grace in Jesus Christ that God does not allow Satan to pull us into the fire below.
You have learned from a lifetime of religion that for those who believe the promise of Christ, the promise is true. But what about those who linger in doubt, even if ever so slight? Do you think that God misses to slightest of thoughts? No. Further, you know from everything that you have heard that for those of you out there who have doubts, God neither has to keep to the promise, nor needs to cast you in. God is bent toward mercy, but is not held to it.
Held by the hands of God over the pit, Satan sends up tendrils of flame, tendrils that snap at your soul through God’s fingers. You look down and horror overcomes your heart. It strikes fear in you when you see that from your own hands you have left a smear. You realize how we are dirtying God’s hands and how easy it would be for God to clear the filth away. And who is to save us from God’s decision? Is there an intermediary to come to our defense? But, some of you doubt Jesus Christ, therefore the fires of hell burn hot and bright below.
Your wickedness makes your body heavy as lead. You slide in God’s hands from your own greasy life. A spider’s web would not be able to save you as you fall, your sin weighs so heavy. You have used this life to satisfy lusts, to drink until happy, to buy and to consume, to put down others while you build yourself up, and you have forgotten the poor, those who have been treated unfairly, and those who struggle because they have lost the person close to them who they need.
The words of Mary’s song ring again through the air. “God has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.” You had forgotten. You knew the words but you had forgotten.
God looks down at you and anger fills God’s eyes. The clouds move in from behind. You grasp onto God’s fingers. The fire burns brighter from your sin and the winds from the storm of God’s anger starts to push you toward the edge.
You make a case to God again about your goodness, grasping at straws, but God knows the truth. None of us are good. None of us are great. You strive to abate the winds, you strive to show yourself in the best possible light, but God’s furry at your inability to come clean about your life grows, and the waters break forth from the storm to wash you away in a torrent of water to meet your steamy end.
God is not mean. God is righteously angry. You cannot blame God, for God is fair and you will not suffer beyond what strict justice requires; fair punishment for every wrong. But, neither shall anything be withheld, because it is so hard for you to bear. Ezek. 8:18. "Therefore will I also deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear them.” How awful are those words, and these from, Isa. 63:3, which are the words of the great God. "I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment."
You stare down at the misery in the fire. You stare down at the end that is waiting for you because of your own wickedness and your own sin.
Now, at this point in a traditional fire and brimstone sermon I would shout out loudly that all who need to trust in our Lord Jesus Christ to save us from such destruction to please come forward...or at least email me so that I can lead you in a prayer that will allow you to trust in Jesus so that he might turn to you and save you.
But, I am a Lutheran preacher, so I will not go there. You get something else instead.
God slowly lowers you into the fire. The fire burns hot. The searing heat is almost unbearable. The fire indeed hurts, but yet you look down to see that you are still there. The fire does not completely destroy you. It has definitely left its mark. It has definitely burned you to the core, but you do not look hideous. Instead, the fire burned away your sin, your doubt, and your pain. You are relieved as you are raised from the fire and you look up and see Jesus holding you. Behind him the storm couds bursts forth. The water pours down on you and washes you clean instead of washing you away. You cling to Jesus' wide open arms. As you cling, you see that the grime you had left on his arm before is washed into the fires of the pit below. Jesus arms remain wide open wide open there-after, always waiting for you cling to his goodness and righteousness again and again.
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